Net neutrality has been a contentious debate, but Google and Verizon appear to have reached a compromise on the issue. (Source: Neoseeker)

Net neutrality has many supporters in the public. (Source: Current News)

Basic premise is that net neutrality applies to wired web, but not wireless

Google,
the world's largest internet business, and Verizon, the largest
wireless network provider in the U.S., have long waged
war over net neutrality. As Google explored wireless
options it resisted Verizon's notion of throttled
traffic. Likewise, as Verizon expanded its wireless traffic
it looked to pursue throttling and other strategies to prevent
"overuse".

Now the pair has worked out their
differences and formed a private pact that may shape the way internet
access is provided across America.

Verizon spokesman David
Fish states, "We’ve been working with Google for 10 months to
reach an agreement on broadband policy. We are currently
engaged in and committed to the negotiation process led by the
FCC."

According to The
New York Times and The
Wall Street Journal,
Google has essentially turned its back on net neutrality in the
mobile sphere and is now working with Verizon to roll out a tiered
scheme that would see internet content providers like YouTube get
faster service for paying more, and smaller sites regulated to the
slow lane.

Mistique Cano, a Washington-based Google
spokeswoman, would not confirm or deny an agreement had been
reached.

Under the agreement, according to sources cited
by Bloomberg,
Verizon would agree not to selectively slow traffic -- such as video
streams -- through its wired connections. However, it would
remain free to apply selective slowing (throttling) as necessary on
its wireless connections, to preserve service.

The agreement
comes as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) looks to iron
out net
neutrality legislation to go before Congress. The FCC
is working with Google, Verizon, AT&T, and others to come to a
proposal that's comprehensive enough, but that everyone can live
with.

Any FCC agreement would likely require
AT&T, who made it clear that it was not on
board with Verizon and Google's pact. Jim Cicconi, AT&T
senior executive vice president, wrote, "AT&T is not a party
to the purported agreement between Google and Verizon. We
remain committed to trying to reach a consensus on this issue through
the FCC process."

Google and Verizon may have been
at-time enemies on the issue of net neutrality, but in the grand
scheme of things they enjoy a close relationship. Verizon is
among the largest carriers of handsets employing Google's wildly
successful operating system Android, which recently passed the
iPhone's version of OS X to become the most used smart phone
operating system in the U.S.

Andrew Jay Schwartzman, senior
vice president of the Washington-based Media Access Project, a
watchdog legal firm, remained skeptical of the deal, commenting,
"What is good for Google and Verizon is not necessarily good for
innovation and competition on the Internet."

"If you can find a PS3 anywhere in North America that's been on shelves for more than five minutes, I'll give you 1,200 bucks for it." -- SCEA President Jack Tretton